n kill any chief who may ever be over you."

And the ape who recalled this wise counsel repeated it to several of
his fellows, so that when Terkoz returned to the tribe that day he
found a warm reception awaiting him.

There were no formalities. As Terkoz reached the group, five huge,
hairy beasts sprang upon him.

At heart he was an arrant coward, which is the way with bullies among
apes as well as among men; so he did not remain to fight and die, but
tore himself away from them as quickly as he could and fled into the
sheltering boughs of the forest.

Two more attempts he made to rejoin the tribe, but on each occasion he
was set upon and driven away. At last he gave it up, and turned,
foaming with rage and hatred, into the jungle.

For several days he wandered aimlessly, nursing his spite and looking
for some weak thing on which to vent his pent anger.

It was in this state of mind that the horrible, man-like beast,
swinging from tree to tree, came suddenly upon two women in the jungle.

He was right above them when he discovered them. The first intimation
Jane Porter had of his presence was when the great hairy body dropped
to the earth beside her, and she saw the awful face and the snarling,
hideous mouth thrust within a foot of her.

One piercing scream escaped her lips as the brute hand clutched her
arm. Then she was dragged toward those awful fangs which yawned at her
throat. But ere they touched that fair skin another mood claimed the
anthropoid.

The tribe had kept his women. He must find others to replace them.
This hairless white ape would be the first of his new household, and so
he threw her roughly across his broad, hairy shoulders and leaped back
into the trees, bearing Jane away.

Esmeralda's scream of terror had mingled once with that of Jane, and
then, as was Esmeralda's manner under stress of emergency which
required presence of mind, she swooned.

But Jane did not once lose consciousness. It is true that that awful
face, pressing close to hers, and the stench of the foul breath beating
upon her nostrils, paralyzed her with terror; but her brain was clear,
and she comprehended all that transpired.

With what seemed to her marvelous rapidity the brute bore her through
the forest, but still she did not cry out or struggle. The sudden
advent of the ape had confused her to such an extent that she thought
now that he was bearing her toward the beach.

For this reason she conserved h